A Mathematician Profiled in Playboy

09.03.2012

When we’re talking about a cultural interest in mathematics and mathematicians, this seems like a sign of a sea change: the reclusive Russian mathematician Grigory Perelman profiled in none other than Playboy magazine. Not a lot on the math, and it’s held out as something only a few hundred people in the world can understand, and Perelman is weird, of course. Still, he’s held up as a person who rejects the world in the manner of a beat poet, a kind of true cool. And it’s Playboy… I don’t know if it counts as cool, but at least it’s something that people read for the articles.